What manner of man
by wanderingsmith
Summary: B/B - rain, luggage and lights


Title: **What manner of man**  
By wanderingsmith  
March 2006  
Couple: B/B  
Rating: PG  
Summary: rain, luggage and lights

Disclaimers: As it is thought, so let it be as said… You make the toys, I play with them.

AN:_was reading through an old folder with 'thought' files and came across this one:  
_I've learned that you can tell a lot about a man by the way he handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights. _  
and I thought, OMG, that sooo needs a Booth fic!. so I challenged my faithful chatter Katie to a race.. I lost, sigh , I could blame my one-handed typing... but to paraphrase Lionel, faster typing would not make my thinking any faster  
_AN2: many thanks to Elyssa for betaing_  
_

They stood a few feet away from the turnstile, discussing the people getting their luggage while keeping an eye out for their own.

"I'm telling you, they're having an affair."

Tempe glared at him, "They could simply be colleagues, or related or" He started laughing and nodded his head to where the couple in question were exchanging a deep kiss down the concourse.

Tempe rolled her eyes. "Fine, he's having an affair with a younger woman! Modern cultures has a completely unreasonable response to mates of different age groups. Anthropologically speaking, choosing someone younger had any number of very good reasons. Young Roman males were enrolled in the army at 17, and by the time they were released at 46 and could afford to marry, the resulting couple was inevitably an older man and a very young woman. And then there's the"

He interrupted her gesturing with a finger wagging in front of her nose. "OK, OK! Just admit you lost the guess! You don't need to compensate just because I have better people instincts..."

They continued to snip back and forth as the turnstile emptied and the crowd dispersed, finally noticing that they were the only ones left, and still no luggage.

"Dammit! My tools were in there!"

"Calm down Bones, lets just go see what's going on." He slipped an arm around her and turned her toward the Tampa arrivals counter.

"I'm sorry Agent Booth, the hold is definitely empty. We'll have to call DC and track where your bags went. Would you like to wait in the lounge for news? Or I can simply get you some vouchers right now for new articles." The young red-head looked spooked every time Bones glared at her and Booth stopped himself from just pulling out the charm. His Bones could react in unpredictable ways to that, sometimes.

"That's alright. We'll take the vouchers." he wrote down their cell numbers as she handed them a custom money voucher with their reported bag values written in, "Please contact us as soon as you find our luggage."

"Of course. American Airlines is always pleased to help the Bureau in any way."

Booth noticed Temperance eyeing him out the corner of her eye as they walked away, "What?"

She raised her brows at him, "I'm waiting to hear the complaints about not having a suit to change into."

"Vouchers, Bones, vouchers."

"Uhu, we both know those fancy suits of yours don't come off the rack fitting you."

He grinned widely, "Ever hear 'Money talks'?"

She frowned at him, "No. And you are still far too cheerful."

He ignored her words and wrapped his arm around her to snag her close and whisper in her ear, "And thank you. Glad to know you notice their fit."

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Booth held the camera cable as steady as he could, following her occasional snapped order.

"Here. You can see the bottom section of the ribcage."

He watched over her shoulder as she wrote down the precise location for the recovery team.

"OK. Let's move further to the right.."

As she spoke, Booth felt three drops of water hit his neck in quick succession. "Ah crap. This should be fun."

He watched as Bones smirked at him, "You need to stop wearing those $1500 suits Booth. You're really not going to be spending time in the right places for it if you stay with me."

He rolled his eyes, reaching up to lift the lapel of his coat to try to cover his neck. "Bones, you're my partner, we stick together. Anyway, maybe your company is worth it; sometimes", he added with a smirk.

Temperance smiled at him sincerely before going back to her video screen, luckily under a protective awning. "We've been lucky the weather's been nice this long anyway. Winter in the Panhandle is usually far wetter."

"And that's suppose to make me feel better, how?"

She smirked to herself; he sounded resigned. She was glad her work overalls were waterproof, she just had the annoyance of water trickling on her exposed skin, and soaking her hair. Maybe they needed a distraction. "What would you rather be doing right now. Assuming the weather is a constant."

He snorted derisively, mentally smiling at her scientific approach to an age-old conversation gambit. "No thinking required there. A chalet on the beach, patio doors in the bedroom, warm comforter, roaring fireplace, beautiful forensic anthropologist with water-wisped hair naked in my bed, filling my arms and warming me up." The rolling cadence of his recitation and soft, dreamy tone made the image crystal clear.

She blinked quickly to hold back sudden tears. Concentrated on breathing calmly as she stared at the everglade watergrass on the screen. "Stop. There. Left femur.", her voice was still a bit hoarse. He had a knack for merging their two lives without breaking a stride that she often wished she could emulate.

If someone had told her a year ago that Seeley Booth would willingly stand in a boat, in the middle of a waterway, in the pouring rain, just because it's where she was working, and would be casually telling her that all he wanted was to be with her. She would have had them committed. After laughing herself silly.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

"I can't believe you insisted on doing this on the way home from the airport!" she opened the door to their flat as she spoke.

Booth rolled his eyes, "It's Christmas Eve Bones, if we don't do this now, it won't be doable. Everything's closed tomorrow."

Temperance mumbled to herself about stubborn males who believed in pagan-religious myths, watching him manhandle the tree into the living room, leaving needles in his wake.

"You want to get the decorations box out of the office closet while I secure this thing to the wall?"

Shaking her head and reminding herself of all the reasons she did like Booth, Temperance dropped her bags, new and old, on the bed before hunting for his, hopefully marked, box of ornaments. She had to admit, he was organized. Angela had told her all sorts of horror stories of what some men called organization when they'd moved in together. And Booth had turned out to most certainly be an angel in that respect.

She found a box with XMAS written in a large masculine scrawl with black marker and dropped it next to Booth. Then went back to the car to get his doubled luggage.

When she walked back into the living room, she found him sitting on the floor untangling an intricate web of little lights while humming Amazing Grace. She stood and stared at him, seeing the happy smile on his face, wondering. It looked like a painstaking, and likely ultimately useless job.

He looked up suddenly and his smile turned tender. He held a hand out to her, "Merry Christmas Bones."

Leaving the bags in the hallway, she walked over and sat down next to him, meeting his kiss and returning it just as tenderly.

She leaned on his arm as he returned to his lights. "I've heard about these. Isn't it annoying to do this every year? Knowing they'll just return to the same state again next year?"

He laughed softly, "It's Christmas. Like the smell of wood smoke in ice cold air. Like carols on the radio and the busy malls. Not all fun, but it all represents Christmas, which represents spending time with the ones you love." He leaned over briefly to kiss the top of her head. "You and Parker. That's what this really is. A mess of lights is just the shape it's taking."

And that was why she loved this man.

END

AN3: _never having HAD to learn Shakespeare, I tend to like his quotes that I encounter, and when I was staring at my title trying to come up with a better one, I remembered the one which has become the title  
_AN4: I despise researching. any references to history, geography, physics, anthropology, crime fighting... is deduced/gleaned from reading, run through the sieve of my rotten memory. feel free to correct me. do it politely, and I'll both make the change and credit, unless it destroys the story, in which case I will disclaim my alternate universe


End file.
